Dry Marking System for Ballistic Pellets

ABSTRACT

A coating designed to transfer on impact from a ballistic projectile onto a target. Due to the many possible applications for which this might find use, it has been designed to allow as open-ended a range of application as possible by separating the requirements of the marking system from the requirements of the projectile substrate. To this end the coating is designed to be applied to a wide range of materials and shapes. The coating itself is therefore independent of whatever carrier it is coated onto which allows the carrier to be selected for its own suitability for the application rather than conditional upon compatibility with the marking system.

This application claims benefit under §119 of U.S. Provisional PatentApplication Ser. No. 61/100,395, filed Sep. 26, 2009, all of whichare/is hereby incorporated by reference in their entirety.

FIELD

This invention relates to a dry marking system for ballistic pellets.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a partial side and partial exposed interior view of aballistic pellet with a pigment transfer coating; and

FIG. 2 is a partial side and partial exposed interior view of anotherballistic pellet with a pigment transfer coating and an imprintedidentifier color code marking.

SUMMARY

A projectile comprising a ballistic pellet and at least one frangiblecoating on an outer surface of the ballistic pellet configured toprovide a dry marking on impact with a target.

A method of making a projectile comprising obtaining a ballistic pelletand coating at least one frangible layer on an outer surface ofballistic pellet configured to provide a dry marking on impact with atarget.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

A frangible coating is applied to Airsoft BB's or other forms ofballistic pellets as a visual marker system for both game play andmilitary and law enforcement training purposes. While it is intended foruse with Airsoft industry standard equipment, it is equally applicableto other devices suitable for propelling the BB's and other forms ofballistic pellets used in these devices. BB's and larger or smallercontact devices may be coated in this manner as a means of transferingpigment to the target, indicating a “hit.”

Surface:

The surface of this BB is improved by allowing random surface characterto develop in the coating process. This provides small imperfections inthe surface on the order of (10̂-1 mm) to (10̂-2 mm). Smallerimperfections may also exist but are irrelevent, the large scaleimperfections of the surface coating produces increased turbulentairflow across the surface when used with any launching strategydesigned to exploit the Bernoulli Effect to increase range for the BB.The surface is frangible and fragments into intensely colored dust onimpact with a target. This allows the BB to leave a visual mark of itspassage for purposes of scoring during game play or other situationswhich may require markings. The coating may be applied as eitherdiscrete layers or as a homogeneous formulated mixture.

This coating can be applied to pellets of either metal, plastic orbiodegradable formulation as shown in FIG. 1. The coating does notdepend upon which formulation is used.

This coating is composed of pigments and optional optical brightenerswhich become bound to the binder surface. This surface then disperses onimpact with a target object leaving the pigment behind as a visualindicator. The pigment surface may optionally be sealed against damagefrom moisture and coated with a thin layer of dry powder lubricant.

Ballistic pellets coated as described can be imprinted to identify themuniquely by color coding as shown in FIG. 2. Unique identification ofpellets allows the competition venue to control the ammunition usedduring play and may address safety issues, revenue generation for theevent, and quality and quantity of ammunition available to thecompetitors.

Ballistic pellets prepared according to described specifications areimprinted with speckles, bands or simple geometric markings usingcontrasting pigments to those used in the initial frangible coating.Multiple imprints allow a set of data fields to be color encoded ontothe surface. The data can be used to identify the event, the team towhich the markers were issued, the manufacturing date, or simply toprovide an interesting appearance to the ballistic marker pellet.

The imprinting introduces small scale color patterns into the surface.The size, shape, and color of the markings may each hold a significantbit of data which interpreted as a whole allows batches of pellets to beidentified uniquely from other batches of pellets as a color codedserial/lot number or the unique encoding may be repeated for multiplebatches and used to uniquely identify the venue or competition eventpurchasing them.

It may also be used to give special visual impact to a ballistic markerpellet for novelty, such as imprinting the pellets with red, white andblue patterns, or imprinting “camouflage” colors onto the pellet.

Ballistic pellets coated as described can be additionally coated with anindelible security marker dye visible only under select wavelengths oflight. An adhesive filler would be substituted for any pigments visiblein normal lighting.

The mark left by such a pellet would be invisible to the unaided eye,but would fluoresce under illumination by a light source in the dye'sexcitation range.

Markers of this type could be used as a delivery system to mark theclothing and skin of a criminal suspect. They could be propelled eitherby manually operated ballistic devices, or loaded into non-injuriousautomated systems for dispersion singly or in bulk. They could be drivenby spring loading, pressurized gas or gravity, striking the suspect andleaving a dye stain on his clothing and exposed skin.

Additional trace elements could be added to the pigment to increasespecificity and extend the period that an identifiable mark remained.Micro-encapsulated DNA from diverse species of plants and marine lifewhich could be easily identified, would be imprinted on the surface asdescribed in GTBKM-002 with the exception that it would not leave avisible color coding imprint but would carry multiple sets of thetracking material, making the combination of chemical markers unique tothe batch of marker pellets.

The encapsulating material would both protect the DNA chemical markerfrom degradation, and provide an adhesive surface to cling aggressivelyto clothing and skin.

The marker would leave no visible mark on clothing and nothing otherthan a possible impact mark on exposed skin, but an excitation lightsource would reveal the mark, and a DNA sample of the impact site onclothing or skin would reveal a DNA signature including as contributionseach DNA imprinting element included in the manufacture.

A coating designed to transfer on impact from a ballistic projectileonto a target. Due to the many possible applications for which thismight find use, it has been designed to allow as open-ended a range ofapplication as possible by separating the requirements of the markingsystem from the requirements of the projectile substrate. To this endthe coating is designed to be applied to a wide range of materials andshapes. The coating itself is therefore independent of whatever carrierit is coated onto which allows the carrier to be selected for its ownsuitability for the application rather than conditional uponcompatibility with the marking system.

1-3. (canceled)
 4. A projectile comprising: a ballistic pellet; and at least one frangible coating on an outer surface of the ballistic pellet configured to provide a dry marking on impact with a target.
 5. The projectile as set forth in claim 4 wherein the ballistic pellet is made from at least one of a solid metal, plastic, and biodegradable material
 6. The projectile as set forth in claim 4 wherein the at least one frangible coating further comprises one or more base pigments.
 7. The projectile as set forth in claim 6 wherein the at least one frangible coating further comprises one or more optical brighteners.
 8. The projectile as set forth in claim 6 further comprising further comprising one or more additional pigments imprinted on the at least one frangible coating, the one or more additional pigments contrast from the one or more base pigments.
 9. The projectile as set forth in claim 8 wherein the one or more additional pigments are imprinted on the at least one frangible coating to encode one or more identifying data fields in the at least one frangible coating.
 10. The projectile as set forth in claim 9 wherein at least one of a size, shape and color of the one or more additional pigments is used to encode the one or more identifying data fields in the at least one frangible coating.
 11. The projectile as set forth in claim 4 further comprising at least one seal on the at least one frangible coating.
 12. The projectile as set forth in claim 11 further comprising at least one dry power lubricant on the at least one seal.
 13. The projectile as set forth in claim 4 wherein the at least one frangible coating further comprises at least one marker which is only visible under a first range of wavelengths of light.
 14. The projectile as set forth in claim 4 wherein the at least one frangible coating comprise at least one fluorescent material.
 15. The projectile as set forth in claim 4 further comprising one or more trace elements imprinted in the at least one frangible coating.
 16. The projectile as set forth in claim 15 wherein the one or more trace elements comprise DNA.
 17. The projectile as set forth in claim 16 further comprising at least one encapsulating material for the DNA.
 18. The projectile as set forth in claim 16 wherein the at least one frangible coating comprise at least one fluorescent material.
 19. A method of making a projectile, the method comprising: obtaining a ballistic pellet; and coating at least one frangible layer on an outer surface of ballistic pellet configured to provide a dry marking on impact with a target.
 20. The method as set forth in claim 19 wherein the obtained ballistic pellet is made from at least one of a solid metal, plastic, and biodegradable material
 21. The method as set forth in claim 19 wherein the at least one frangible layer further comprises one or more base pigments.
 22. The method as set forth in claim 21 wherein the at least one frangible layer further comprises one or more optical brighteners.
 23. The method as set forth in claim 21 further comprising further comprising imprinting one or more additional pigments on the at least one frangible layer, the one or more additional pigments contrast from the one or more base pigments.
 24. The method as set forth in claim 23 wherein the imprinting the one or more additional pigments on the frangible layer further comprises encoding one or more identifying data fields in the at least one frangible layer with the imprinting.
 25. The method as set forth in claim 24 wherein at least one of a size, shape and color of the one or more additional pigments is used to encode the one or more identifying data fields in the at least one frangible layer.
 26. The method as set forth in claim 19 further comprising coating at least one seal on the at least one frangible layer.
 27. The method as set forth in claim 26 further comprising coating at least one dry power lubricant on the at least one seal.
 28. The method as set forth in claim 19 wherein the at least one frangible layer further comprises at least one marker which is only visible under a first range of wavelengths of light.
 29. The method as set forth in claim 19 wherein the at least one frangible layer comprise at least one fluorescent material.
 30. The method as set forth in claim 19 further comprising imprinting one or more trace elements in the at least one frangible layer.
 31. The method as set forth in claim 30 wherein the one or more trace elements comprise DNA.
 32. The method as set forth in claim 30 further comprising encapsulating the DNA with at least one encapsulating material.
 33. The method as set forth in claim 30 wherein the at least one frangible layer comprise at least one fluorescent material. 